Category: stalking

‘It was the chilling 1987 blockbuster about a spurned lover who wreaks revenge on a married man by launching a terrifying stalking campaign against him and his family. But when the wife of a hedge fund manager discovered her husband was having an affair – and his jilted mistress began viciously harassing her online – she said it felt like she had walked onto the set of Fatal Attraction.’

‘Police officers are to face disciplinary charges over the case of a woman murdered after being stalked by her former partner, whose repeated pleas for help instead saw her fined for wasting police time.’

‘A new civil order that will help protect victims of stalking has received Royal Assent today, and is included as part of the government’s wider commitments to tackle violence against women and girls.’

‘This summary does not cover every eventuality but intends to outline some of the possible criminal offences that may be committed. It should not be treated as legal advice and is not meant to be an exhaustive account of this area of law.

The police are responsible for investigating an allegation that a crime has been committed. Following investigation, the decision whether to charge a person with a criminal offence lies either with the police or the CPS.

Where a series of existing offences – including harassment and public order offences – are committed, and such an offence was motivated by hostility to race or religion, or was accompanied by hostility to race or religion proximate to the commission of the offence, a separate racially or religious aggravated offence is committed attracting a greater penalty. For further details, see the CPS-published guidance on this website. For those offences not covered but where hostility or hostile motivation towards race or religion is present, or hostility or hostile motivation towards disability, sexual orientation or transgender is present, this must be treated as an aggravating factor at sentence and stated as such in open court.’

‘Stalker Callum Blake-O’Brien created numerous fake social media accounts to send women what prosecutors described as “unimaginably horrendous” messages. One teenager left “emotionally numb” by his unrelenting abuse says he “handpicked” his victims to cause maximum distress.’